


Confront, Evade, Acquire

by scifihobbit



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:09:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,707
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28249671
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scifihobbit/pseuds/scifihobbit
Summary: Ezri comes by Quark's after hours and they reconnect over a game of tongo. Set early season 7.
Comments: 4
Kudos: 20
Collections: Star Trek Secret Santa 2020





	Confront, Evade, Acquire

**Author's Note:**

  * For [InsideMyBrain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/InsideMyBrain/gifts).



> Written for 2020 Star Trek Secret Santa for oomox who requested: quark & jadzia (and/or ezri) friendship

Confront, Evade, Acquire

It was just after 0100. Ezri had been pacing back and forth in front of the door to Quark’s bar for minutes now. Quark knew this because he could hear her. He could hear every one of her frustrated footsteps. She had a particularly way of walking—just like everyone. Her heel hit the ground hard, almost a stomp, this was the little noise that showed how irritated she was with herself, but then she rolled onto the ball of her foot so tentatively, like she was apologizing for the tantrum that had come just before. Every once in a while there would be a little trip in her step though, a little hiccup, and a foot would fall more confidently. Her pacing would turn into striding for just a moment and Quark could hear Jadzia in her gait.

All the glasses were rinsed and put away. All the counters were wiped down. And Ezri was still out there. Quark had been trying to let this end naturally. He’d wagered that she would give up and pace off to her quarters, there was a slim margin that she’d actually come in the door herself, but this had gone on longer than even he would lay odds on. So, finally, he called, “I can hear you.”

“Oh!” Ezri jumped, the syllable an embarrassed burst of breath. And then, “Of course you can. I should’ve known that.”

“Well, are you coming in?”

“The door’s locked,” she responded meekly.

“Oh,” Quark said. “Of course it is.” He unintentionally mirrored Ezri’s phrasing, and remained unwilling to admit that he was nervous about this encounter, too.

Quark unlocked the door and stepped aside with a sweep of his hand. “Quark’s is always open for a night cap. For you.”

“I couldn’t sleep,” Ezri said. She slid onto a stool at the end of the bar near the staircase to the holosuites. It was the same seat Jadzia had always sat in after she and Kira had finished a holosuite adventure. They’d stay for one drink. Kira would complain about the faults of whatever new program Jadzia had selected and Jadzia would convince her to try this new one she’d just found next time.

Quark started to pour Ezri a black hole and she shook her head. “I know I don’t like those. Even the Curzon in my head can’t convince me otherwise.”

“What would you like then?” Quark set the bottles back on their shelves. “A warm glass of Earth cow’s milk?”

Ezri gagged. “What?”

“O’Brien is always saying it works wonders on Molly. Though, from the looks Bashir gives him when he says it, I doubt it’s medically proven.”

“Ew,” was all Ezri had to say in response.

“Well, how about a nice cup of swevna tea?”

“Okay.”

“And I have just the thing to spice it up,” Quark said, shaking a bottle of some brown liquor Ezri didn’t recognize and waggling his brow.

“Okay.” Ezri stared down at her hands on the bartop and twisted them around each other. She started to say something once and stopped, twice and stopped.

Quark made it look like he was very busy preparing the tea, totally consumed by the fine measurements and details of crafting a drink. This was a technique he’d perfected over the years, and whoever was on the other side of the bar always got around to saying what they couldn’t eventually.

He was pouring the thinnest stream of the spicy liquor into the steaming mug when Ezri finally said, “This is the night we usually play tongo.”

Quark’s hand twitched, and a drop of the hot tea splashed onto his hand. He flinched and hissed, “Ow!”

“Are you alright?” Ezri leaned across the counter, trying to get a closer look.

“Yes, yes.” Quark flapped the hand at her and lifted the mug onto the counter. “I’m fine. Here.”

Picking up the mug Ezri tilted it toward Quark just a little and a small smile tugged at the corner of her mouth, a smile that could have had all the cockiness of one of Jadzia’s if Ezri had let it grow a little more. “Thanks, Quark.”

“I didn’t think you remembered,” Quark said into the silence that followed Ezri’s first slurping sip.

“Oh, of course I do! Jadzia always looked forward to Tongo night.” She peered more closely at the mug she was cradling between her palms. “This is actually good.”

“Well thank you very much,” Quark played at being offended. “It’s not as if that’s how I make my living.”

“No, it’s just, I mean, I have a lot of trouble finding things I like these days. Things that aren’t all complicated and tied up to other people’s tastes—or even my tastes from just a year ago! And I like this.”

“Well,” Quark said, somewhat more earnestly this time, “you’re welcome.”

There was another moment of mostly easy and entirely companionable silence between them. Ezri took a larger swallow of her tea.

“You know,” Quark was leaning against the back wall of the bar, “Jadzia still owes me six strips of latinum. I haven’t come to collect from you yet because I’m really not sure how debts are incurred or inherited with the whole,” he fluttered his hand around, “Trill thing. Your economy’s got to be a mess. I should look into it. How about we just play a game and then I can make the debt officially yours, Ezri?”

“Or I could win it back,” Ezri said.

“Hah! Fat chance.”

“Get that wheel set up,” Ezri challenged, looking as ruthless as she was capable of—which wasn’t very.

“You’re going to regret this,” Quark said.

“Not likely.”

\---

An hour later they were still around the tongo wheel. Ezri was in the lead, but only by a slip of latinum. The clunk of the wheel as it spun was calming. Every turn made Quark’s lobes tingle ever so slightly with possibilities.

“Confront!” Ezri yipped, laying her hand down with a smack.

Quark peered at her cards. “How…? Well, this round’s to you, I guess. We’re playing a full fiscal year, right?”

Ezri looked at her pile of winnings and shrugged slightly, smiling. “If you want a few more chances to lose that’s fine with me.”

Quark grabbed up the cards to shuffle them.

“Nope,” Ezri said. “My deal,” and she grabbed the cards right back out of his hands.

“I don’t believe this,” Quark muttered. Not sure whether he was more annoyed or surprised. He hadn’t wanted to play Ezri into bankruptcy immediately, but he certainly hadn’t expected the game to get this far into the fiscal year. Of course, it was because he was going easy on her at first he told himself. Jadzia had been one of his worthiest opponents, and though the loss of her made him ache for many reasons, there was a particular sort of sting whenever he played tongo and she wasn’t there.

“I guess I remember more about this game than you expected, huh?” Ezri was dealing the cards deftly, her hands surprisingly sure of themselves, steadier than usual.

“It’s not just that,” Quark said. “Tongo is about more than knowing the rules, which you clearly do. 99% percent of Tongo is in—”

“—the lobes,” Ezri finished for him. “That is what you always said.”

“That is what I always say. And you’ve clearly got some good ones.”

“I wish that were true in any other situation.” Ezri stared at the hand she’d just dealt, her face completely impassive. She was even good at bluffing Quark marveled.

“I find Tongo to be quite a useful metaphor for life, an excellent guide when navigating the great material continuum.”

“That’s because your whole life revolves around business deals.” Ezri spun the wheel. It was Quark’s turn to call.

“Maybe.” he laid his cards face down and looked at Ezri earnestly. “But there’s more to it than that. Say Odo comes in here demanding to take me in for questioning for whatever petty crime he’s fixated on today. Do I confront him and lay out clearly how he’s in the wrong? Do I evade and give him non-answers while subtly suggesting someone else is at fault? Do I acquire and learn a thing or two from Odo’s line of questioning so that maybe I can catch up to the so-called criminal first and blackmail them into some sort of deal? That all depends on what’s in my hand. Maybe I saw the object in question on a patron the night before. Maybe I know one of my less-than-reputable associates is on the station. And what’s the risk at this round? Maybe Odo’s in a particularly foul mood because it’s been a little too long since he regenerated. Maybe Rom’s off-duty that day and if I ask nicely he’ll wipe whatever record Odo might keep of our conversation.”

Ezri had set her cards down, too, and was listening intently.

“See? It’s about more than just business. It’s about everything.”

“A lot of cultures have games they say explain the entire nature of life,” Ezri said. “Sisko would claim baseball is all you need to understand the universe. There are Cardassians who model their behavior based on popular kotra strategies.”

“Ah, but you don’t know how to play those. Those games aren’t in your lobes. It turns out Tongo still is.”

“Maybe.”

“Definitely.” Quark spun the wheel.

\--- 

At the end of the fiscal year Ezri managed to have just a little more profit than the debt Jadzia had owed. She collected her one strip and three slips of latinum from Quark with a grin. “Thanks for the tea.”

Quark grumbled. “I offer you a drink out of the generosity of my heart when you come in here looking like a kicked canine and you still insist on collecting all your winnings.”

“I haven’t gone soft,” Ezri said. “Besides, it runs in my family. Haven’t I ever told you my mother is a ruthless business mogul?”

“You have not mentioned that before.” Quark tilted his head, intrigued. “Maybe you’ll have to put me in touch.”

“I’ll tell you all about her,” Ezri said, and then hesitated before saying, “next week?”

“Next week,” Quark confirmed.


End file.
